The final cost
by Peladon
Summary: AU on PJs screen fanfic. Tauriel acts before Thranduil disarms her. WARNING - character death SECOND WARNING you might want to skip this if you consider Tauriel cool or noble and/or a role model for women. A slightly shorter version of this was posted at AO3


_**All belomgs to whoever international law says it does which isn't me and I'm content. For fun only**_

 **With apologies to Tolkien who knew war and love for real and would never have been so crass, nor so foolish, as to create the possibility**

 **The final cost  
**

Somehow she had expected him to halt when he saw her, to remain where he was, but he did not. Her first miscalculation.

Instead he outpaced his hovering guard and advanced down the narrow path towards her, his expression cold and hard. The anger hung like a fog around him, a mist that hid the pain and grief that she would have felt if she had opened her mind to anything but the bitterness within her. But she remained fixed only upon her determination that this time he would take notice.

Somehow she had imagined that he would remain silent, awed by her taunts and eloquence, that was her second miscalculation.

For all the time he advanced he answered her, his honeyed voice streaming words she did not want to hear, truths she would not own. He came to a just a swords distance from her, close enough for her to read the fury in his face as he looked at her, there was no softness there, no hint of sympathy or regret. Instead he made no attempt to hide that his only desire, was to dismiss her, to be past her and be about other business, concerned with other things. About the nusiness of war and his army and retreat, concerned with anything but his duty to her and to the dwarves.

Somehow she had thought that the those others present would support her in her claims and demands, that they whisper words of support to her, that they would seek to sway the King to her wishes, and that was her third miscalculation.

Behind him his guards looked at her cold faced, with a angry contempt even. Some part of her mind registered with shock that more than one of them had set arrow to bow with her in their sight, what would they do then when she pressed her challenge? She did not know but she did not fear them for some deep part of her was sure he would not let them harm her. So, sure of her claims and undaunted, she closed her mind to their expressions and focussed her attention upon him alone.

She concentrated on his stony expression and the ice in his eyes, at the sword still grasped in his armoured hand.

She wanted to hurt him, oh how she wanted to hurt him. That he had protected her from her earliest youth did not matter, that he had given her a life of meaning and a place of respect when she had lost everything did not matter, that he had been her family did not matter. All that was a dust beneath his booted feet and all she knew was her bitterness, her anger and the desire to hurt.

The sword caused her a moments pause, for he was strong and swift and skilled, he had survived many battles by being so. The nature of his sword, the power of his arm and the trueness of his eye was such that even orc armour was little defence against him, she would have no defence at all should he decide to smite her. But she did not let that deter her, for what did truly she have to fear after all? He would not slay his own and even if he forgot himself so much as to consider it Legolas was only a pace or two away and so she was safe, for the son would not allow the father to exact revenge for her threats.

Yet there was no sign of uncertainty in the king's eyes as she challenged him, no air of apology as she berated him, no hint that he might relent at all. She had drawn his son away from him to show her power and still he would not give her what she wanted, nothing it seemed would change. Very well on his head be it, she would hurt him as much as she could. Hurt might yet prevail.

The arrow was at her bowstring in a trice, her aim unwavering, her eyes narrowed in anger and her voice was a hiss of hate. He would know the true measure of her rage.

'There is no love in you'

There it was said, now he knew and he would suffer for it for ever.

She waited for him to hang his head, to see him realise and admit his fault, to reach his hand out to her and to beg for her forgiveness. The moments stretched like the bow string and yet he did none of those things. Instead he came closer his blue eyes holding hers with the force of his knowing, his years of living, as much as his kingship, and all the time that silken voice poured out more words she did not want to hear. Words that told her he would not capitulate, words that suggested that he knew the truth. A truth she could not bear for him to know

For a second he looked away as if he could no longer hold his irritation in check, or perhaps it was a moment of calculation and thought, but the breaking of his gaze was the final signal that he would not relent. Then a momentary tensing of his arm told her that he was preparing to act, disarm her, for she still did not fear her death at his hands, and she knew that all hope was gone.

Did she mean to let the arrow fly? She was not sure, only that as he turned back towards her she knew that he would not capitulate. There was a split second when time seemed to freeze and all she could see was the ice in those blue eyes and the angry set of his jaw and she knew without doubt that had made her final throw and had lost.

With a hiss similar to those of her words the arrow flew and there was no time to turn it away even had she wished to.

He had not expected it and realisation came a fragment of a second too late, he turned his head but it was not far enough for she had been too close and he had trusted for a moment too long. It took him in the eye and he, her protector and her king, must have been dead before he fell. But she could not be sure because she did not stay to see, instead she turned and ran before his guards recovered from their shock. Behind her she heard Legolas cry out, but she gave it no thought as she ran, stumbling over broken stone and icy cobbles with her bow clutched in her hand, until she thought they would have lost her in the battle and the snow. All thoughts of Legolas and his loss were pushed aside, her only remaining concern being to leave the City before the battle was over and the inevitable pursuit began.

At the broken city walls she turned for a moment to look behind her but there was nothing but war to be seen, turning her back on that she stared out towards Ravenhill and realised that there was no sanctuary there for her any longer. Kili had made his choice when he had followed his uncle into battle and even if he lived the king under the mountain would not accept an elf who had killed her king into his house. No there was nothing for her there any longer. For a moment she hesitated but as the eagles came speeding down the wind to aid the embattled forces of the light she turned south towards the river.

Perhaps she had expected to die there on the open land and perhaps in the end that would have been for the best, But the battle remained at a distance and she was across the river before the forces of Bolg scattered before the eagles and the renewed attack of the elves.

She heard later that Legolas left that day and never returned to Mirkwood. Where he went she did not know but it seemed likely that, if he survived his grief and guilt, he sailed west.

Without their Sindar king the Sylvan elves of Mirkwood returned to the old ways, the Woodland Realm fragmenting into small groups of elves either living in the forests or wandering across the lands of the south and east, a few made their way to other elven colonies but their welcome was grudging and most moved on again. The last great elven kingdom died with the last great Elvenking, leaving the forest and its inhabitants unprotected.

Time passed and she wandered the edges of the world making what shifts she could to survive, avoiding contact with elf and dwarf alike. Many hours she spent alone under tree and hedge her mind wandering in the fields of the past, often lost in dreams of another world where she had not followed the dwarf. Years passed and the lands around the Lonely Mountain grew rich again or so the snatch of stories from passing merchants said. Dain grew old and Bard died and was buried with great ceremony, she risked a visit to Dale to see the ceremony for those who had been present in that battle remained the only things real for her now.

In the east Sauron rose again as Thranduil had always held he would, spreading evil and fear across the world from his fortress in Mordor once again. When the the One Ring surfaced in the Shire he sent out his armies across the world to wage war. It was said that Elrond the Lore master and the grey wizard tried to destroy the Ring, sending it in the charge of a Hobbit to Mount Doom, but the quest failed and though Sauron never regained the ring it was not destroyed. The fate of the Hobbit and the ring was not known and its shadow remained hanging like a cloud of war bats above the world. Elrond and his kin sailed west taking the elven rings to safety and though a man sat on the throne of Gondor again his days were filled with battle and grief.

When the war of the Ring began she gathered her remaining courage and returned to Mirkwood to join with those that might be left there to defend, only to find the King's halls were abandoned and all her kin were gone, nothing of value remained to be defended., only the forest itself. Even so she remained there wandering the great stone halls that Thranduil had built, spending her time recalling days gone by.

It was from the kings balcony that she saw the forest start to burn. As the smoke curled into the autumn air she put her hands over her ears in an attempt not to hear the cries of the trees and the forest life, running to the empty throne of the Woodland Realm to hide herself in its shadow.

As she heard the tramp of the approaching Easterlings she wondered what difference an Elvenking might have made.


End file.
